Free Rest Not in Peace by Mel Starr

Chamberlain to bring wine. The sheriff, whose duty this should be, would enjoy a cup of malmsey, or perhaps claret, while I sought enlightenment from a strapping man who dislikes me. His wife cares little for me, as well, but I have already written of that tale.

B eing in no hurry to seek a favor of the smith, I lingered at the bridge over Shill Brook to watch the bubbling stream make its way to the Thames. How long, I wondered, would it take a twig to float to London? I picked up a bit of broken branch the size of a finger and tossed it into the stream. Would I discover Sir Henry’s murderer before it drifted past the Tower? I would not do so gazing into the brook. Pleasant things are oft unprofitable. Were it otherwise, all men would be prosperous.
    For all his great strength Edmund must have feeble nostrils. The power of his odor is as great as his arms. The man does strenuous and filthy work, ’tis true, but seems not to mind the accumulation of grime and sweat which he seldom scours away.
    So I was prepared for the fragrance of Edmund’s forge when I entered the place; a mixture of coal smoke, hot iron, and unwashed humanity. Edmund looked up from his anvil as my shadow darkened his open door, saw who it was who entered, then returned to hammering at a slab of red-hot iron. I waited while the work cooled. Then the smith placed it back amongst the coals and turned to his bellows.
    “Have you ever made such a tool as this?” I said, holding the slender, pointed rod before him and trying to breathe through my mouth. I wondered if the smith’s stench would linger upon me so that Kate would demand I disrobe in the toft and bathe before entering Galen House.
    Edmund squinted at the awl and mistook it for a nail. “Aye… make nails all the time. You never see one before?” he added sarcastically.
    “’Tis no nail. Here, look closely. What is its use, you think?”
    “Ah, a bodkin. Made one for Bogo Tailor. That was long ago, him bein’ dead nearly five years.”
    “Of what use was it to the tailor?”
    “Poked holes in leather an’ canvas an’ stuff as was too tough for ’is needle to pierce.”
    “Could this be the bodkin you made?”
    Edmund snorted. “’Ow could I know that? They’re all alike… an’ it’s been years past.”
    “You’ve not been asked to make anything similar since?”
    “Nay,” he said, and turned back to his bellows.
    I had not entered Edmund’s forge expecting to learn much, so was not disappointed. I left the forge and walked up Church View Street to Galen House, where I also expected to learn little. This assumption, however, proved wrong.
    Kate was preparing our supper, Bessie at the hem of her cotehardie, when I opened our door. Kate was bent over the hearth, frying a dish of hanoney upon scattered coals. I had neglected my postponed dinner in a desire to be at the trail of a felon, and my stomach took the moment to remind me of its empty state.
    “What news?” she said as she stood from her cramped labor.
    “I have found a murder weapon, I think, and perhaps a bit of cloth used to wipe away Sir Henry’s blood when the man was slain.”
    I drew the items from my pouch and held them forth. Kate shrank from the objects as from an adder.
    “That bodkin was plunged into Sir Henry’s ear?” she asked.
    “So I believe. I found it hidden, driven into the base of a lampstand, in the chamber where two of Sir Henry’s squires lodge.”
    “One of them has slain his lord, then?”
    “So Sir Roger believes.”
    “You do not?”
    “’Tis all too neat and simple. The sheriff found a scrap of parchment upon the floor of his chamber this morn. Someone slid it under his door in the night. It told him to seek for what he hoped to find in the squires’ chamber.”
    “And that is the bloody cloth?” Kate asked, curling her lip in distaste.
    “Aye. A scrap of linen, of the finer sort. Perhaps torn from a gentleman’s kirtle.”
    Kate’s curiosity overcame her distaste and